Great Shot of the Week

Amazon Women on the Moon (1987)

(Segment) Dir. Joe Dante

This week’s scene comes from a different kind of source: a mostly terrible film. Amazon Women on the Moon was pitched as a pseudo-sequel to Kentucky Fried Movie, another mess of a comedic anthology film, certainly not without its brilliant touches. Amazon Women on the Moon collected many directors, ranging from the well-known to more obscure TV directors. The segment I’d like to point out though is a brilliant one from Joe Dante, the eternally underrated auteur of Gremlins 2: The New Batch and Matinee, just to name my two favorites. (Yes, I am absolutely serious).

This segment shows Dante’s deft handling of pop-culture criticism mixed with great re-appropriation of film styles, in this instance two riffs on late-night TV standards; A Siskel & Ebert-esque film criticism show and a bawdy comedic roast, both revolving around an average suburbanite Harvey Pitnik, and his eventual demise. In both scenes, Dante revels in over-the-top commentary, a style that came to its apex with Gremlins 2, and he creates an uncomfortable collision of the media invading personal life, something we have definitely only embraced more.